


suppose I said I loved you

by jdphoenix



Category: Agents of S.H.I.E.L.D. (TV)
Genre: Episode: s01e21 Ragtag, F/M, Implied/Referenced Brainwashing
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2016-09-25
Updated: 2016-09-25
Packaged: 2018-08-17 08:10:14
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,749
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/8136812
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/jdphoenix/pseuds/jdphoenix
Summary: He seems conflicted for a moment, as though unsure of himself - and he should be, she certainly is with the way he’s taken to touching her - before finally settling on the most absurd instruction: "Take a deep breath."





	

Ward is smiling. That cannot be good.

He gives a jerk of his head and another agent seems to materialize from behind him. That is of course impossible, the man must have been hidden by the half-open door, but it doesn’t stop Jemma’s heart from leaping into her throat in fright as her fear multiplies.

“Get Fitz secured on the jet,” Ward orders, that eerie smile still locked on Jemma. “I need to have a few words with Simmons here.”

Fitz tries to fight of course, good man that he is, but when the gun being aimed through the window at her swivels in his direction, she screams. The agent attempting to subdue him is not affected in the slightest, but Fitz is. He stills, turns - just for a heartbeat, but it’s long enough. A fist lands against his cheek and she lets out another shriek.

“Knock it off,” Ward snaps and that does stop the agent. He hauls Fitz to his feet to more easily drag him from the room.

She throws a fearful look after them, which Fitz meets with one of his own. People have often remarked, on the occasions she and Fitz would work together, that it seemed they were communicating almost telepathically. Even Skye made similar accusations once the Bus assignment brought them together on a more permanent basis. Now she prays he will read her insistence that he _go along_ , if only so that he might live long enough for the others to find them. Which they will. They have to.

Ward steps close, blocking her vision, and what’s worse, his hands cup her cheeks in a manner far more familiar than they’ve ever been before. Her heart stutters to a halt and her breath catches as she meets his smiling eyes. His thumb moves lightly over her cheek, such a small motion that she almost thinks he must not know he’s even doing it.

He seems conflicted for a moment, as though unsure of himself - and he should be, she certainly is with the way he’s taken to touching her - before finally settling on the most absurd instruction: “Take a deep breath.”

She doesn’t of course, but she is reminded of the faint burning in her lungs and slowly releases the breath she’s been holding.

“You know who you are,” he goes on, his tone somewhere between reverent and mocking. “You know where your loyalties lie. Loyalty will be rewarded. Are you ready to return to the fold?”

And then he waits, apparently expecting an answer to whatever that nonsense was.

“You really are insane, aren’t you?” she asks. It surprises him - though she doesn’t see why it should - enough that his hold loosens, enabling her to back swiftly away.

He stares after her, something like horror on his face. “Jemma, baby, this isn’t funny.”

“No, it most certainly is not,” she agrees. “Not only have I been captured by the traitor whose life I cannot believe I wasted energy saving on multiple occasions, he’s also a complete nutter!”

He rushes at her so suddenly all she can do is freeze like some frightened animal. He catches her face in his hands again, more forceful this time, and repeats those silly phrases he spouted before. There’s no mockery in his tone now though. Now he is deadly serious and she wishes, despite her better judgment that encouraging a madman is madness in itself, that she knew how to respond in order to wipe that look off his face.

His thumb strokes her cheekbone after he’s finished and he swallows, looking more like a frightened child than a mass murderer when he asks, “Jem?”

“I think,” she says carefully, calmly, “that I would like to be imprisoned along with Fitz now.”

Ward’s hands fall away and he steps back in a daze. Whatever he was expecting, it was most certainly not that. “Okay,” he says after a moment. He runs a shaking hand through his hair. “Okay, we’ll just- we’ll get you to Whitehall. We might have to wait until things settle down, but it’ll be fine.”

He takes her hand, startling her with how quickly he’s managed to close the distance between them.

“You just keep your head, do as you’re told, and everything will be fine.” It sounds more like he’s trying to convince himself than her. He kisses her fingertips - she tries and fails to pull her hand away before he can - and then he’s pulling her out the door. At least, she thinks, she’ll see that Fitz is all right.

 

 

She does see Fitz, though only for as long as it takes the quinjet to dock with the Bus. Once they’re on board, he’s taken to the Cage despite her strenuous protests. (He may be alive, but he has not been unharmed. In addition to the bruise coming in on his jaw, there’s a nasty cut on his forehead that needs seeing to.)

Ward sits her on one of the couches. His hands press her shoulders very firmly, as though he expects that will seal her in place, and he doesn’t so much order as ask that she stay put.

She’s going to need to apologize to Skye, she thinks. She really thought her claims as to Ward’s waning sanity were overblown. Now she knows they were rather minimized.

Ward’s distraction draws her attention, and she finds Garrett and Raina emerging from the cargo bay. Lovely.

Garrett’s smile when he sees her is, if possible, even more disturbing than Ward’s was. “Well!” He claps his hands together. “Now we can get started!”

As Jemma has no plans to help Garrett, she resolutely faces front and resolves to ignore him for as long as possible.

“What’s with her?”

“It didn’t take,” Ward says tightly.

“What didn’t take?”

“The restoration phrase that Whitehall gave us. It didn’t take. She’s-” He drops his crossed arms to gesture at her so violently she flinches- “ _that_ ,” he finishes as if that says it all.

“Oh.” Garrett draws the word out as he slides onto the coffee table in front of her. She tightens her knees around the edge of the couch seat. “Oh hohoho,” he says, examining her carefully. “Probably you’re just too soft a touch, kid. You’ve gotta have a firm hand. How long did it take you to teach old Buddy to fetch, huh?”

Ward rolls his eyes while Garrett chuckles.

“All right, princess, you just listen real good to me now.” Garrett leans in intently and repeats precisely the words Ward said to her in that shack on the airfield. His tone is firm, resolute, but as before, she has no bloody idea what any of it is meant to mean to her.

“I don’t know what you’re expecting,” she says when he’s finished, “and frankly I don’t much care.”

Behind her, Raina makes a sound that might be the beginnings of a laugh. Garrett looks very cross, though not at Raina or even at Jemma. And Ward continues to look displeased.

“Fucking Whitehall,” Garrett mutters, slapping his knees as he stands to pace the lounge. “We’re what? Seven, eight days into the uprising and I’m still down my best mind because that asshole couldn’t install a restoration phrase correctly? Damn compliance specialists.” He jabs a finger in Jemma’s direction. “This is why we use incentives.”

“We don’t need incentives with her,” Ward snaps. “That’s the whole damn point.”

Garrett shoots him a pitying look. “Well she’s still dangerous, even if she doesn’t remember a damn thing. Lock her up.”

“I’m not putting her in the-”

“I didn’t say you had to,” Garrett cuts in, sounding like he’s hit on an old argument. “But I need her to not blow us out of the air, okay?” He waves an arm carelessly towards her as he heads back out, Raina on his heels. “Get it done.”

The lounge clears, leaving her alone with Ward. Given not only the erratic way he’s behaved since capturing her, but the things he’s done in the last week (the last _year_ ), she’s not certain that’s any better.

He stares at her, a strange hollowness in his eyes that is only underlined by the croak in his voice when he says, “Come on.”

She considers refusing - he has orders to _lock her up_ and though he fought them (for reasons she cannot begin to fathom), he’s still going to follow through. But he’s more than capable of forcing her along and there’s Fitz to think about. If Garrett is willing to hold Mike Peterson’s young son as leverage, what worse will he do to a man who threatened him when last they met?

Her friend’s safety in mind, she stands and allows Ward to usher her into the hall. She’s surprised he’s not heading for the Cage and thinks he must be planning on taking the back stairs down into the cargo hold so as to avoid another brush with Garrett, but he surprises her again by stopping.

“I suppose you wouldn’t tell me if you had any weapons or potential bombs hidden in your bunk?” he asks.

She doesn’t. The Bus is short on room and as such she’s been required to abandon her habit of taking her science to bed with her, meaning very little that might be of use to her now has made its way up from the labs. That doesn’t mean she feels inclined to inform Ward of that fact. She stands in stony silence.

“Right,” he sighs and tugs her into his bunk.

She falls onto the bed with very little effort on his part. The spot he gripped her arm seems to burn now that he’s no longer holding her. He begins rooting around in his closet and drawers, pulling out weapons she never would have imagined were hidden inside. She curls her knees up to her chest as, slowly, she realizes he really does intend on locking her in here. Not the Cage with Fitz, not a cold cargo container, not the med pod, not even handcuffing her to a railing and leaving a guard to loom over her.

“Ward?” she asks. She’s just as startled as he is by the question, but now that it’s out she’s not going to waste the opportunity. “What are you doing?”

“Making sure you can’t hurt anyone who comes in to check on you,” he says, flashing a small blade at her before pocketing it like he has at least half a dozen before it.

“Yes, but why? I mean,” she amends quickly, because the why of that is rather obvious, “why are you locking me in here? Why not somewhere-” she doesn’t know a tactful way to express the medieval dungeon-style captivity she expected from HYDRA, and so ends with a simple- “else?”

He closes the drawer with his hip as he straightens. He looks tired. She would feel sorry for him if his exhaustion weren’t due entirely to his own heinous choices.

“And what was all of that about back there?” she presses, unable to stop now that she’s begun. “What do you and Garrett think to accomplish by saying nonsense to me? And who is this Whitehall person you’re taking me to? What is a compliance specialist?”

He’s not looking at her. His eyes are shut and, as she speaks, his mouth slowly curves into a faint smile. Much as she wants answers, there is a part of her terrified to know what that smile means.

She cringes back when his eyes finally meet hers again. She doesn’t know what’s in them any more than she knows what was in his smile, but she doesn’t like it one bit.

“I’m not going to hurt you,” he says and seems to flounder after he does, as though he’d planned on more but thought better of it.

“You’ll understand if I don’t believe you, considering how many of the agents who’ve trusted you you killed in recent days.”

“I would _never_ hurt you.” He sounds so sincere. There’s more emotion in those five little words than she’s ever heard from him.

She squirms on the bed, not sure what to think, only to grow still as she realizes she’s currently sitting on the bed of a man she doesn’t know at all, a man she has great reason to fear. He might not be planning on killing her or hurting her in the traditional sense, but there are worse things he could do.

“ _No_ ,” he says, tone and expression both dark. “I wouldn’t- That’s not gonna happen.”

Her fingers curl tighter around her calves. “You’ll understand if I don’t believe you.”

That’s a mistake. She’s made him angry now. But there is a foolish, surely suicidal, _vengeful_ part of her that crows in triumph. She may not be able to do him physical damage the way he did all those innocent agents, but a few cutting words are the least of what he deserves.

“I have a girlfriend,” he says, startling her. Not only is it completely out of the blue, but all those months together and she didn’t know Ward had a girlfriend. Of course, she didn’t know him very well at _all_ , so it stands to reason. “She’s HYDRA. She’d kill me if I ran around on her - literally.”

“I’m sure the two of you deserve each other,” she says and tries not to examine the hollow each fond word he speaks on the subject carves in her heart.

“No,” he says easily. “She’s way too good for me. Smart, pretty, sweet too - too sweet for HYDRA. Or it looks like it from a distance anyway. She smiles at everyone and is like sunshine personified, but sometimes she’ll get a little too excited about whatever weird thing she’s studying. Sometimes she’s in too much of a hurry to wait for a _di_ ssection.” He shrugs, smiling like it’s a cute quirk.

Jemma’s stomach turns. “She sounds lovely.”

“Yeah. Loyal too.” Up to now his focus has been off of her and on some phantom memory of this girlfriend of his, but now it snaps back to Jemma. He moves closer to her in the already tight space. “She knew I didn’t have the background to find whatever cured Coulson, not unless he out and told it to me himself, so she insisted on coming with me. Only, here’s the thing: smart as my girl is, long as she’s been HYDRA, she still can’t tell a lie to save her life.”

Every nerve in Jemma’s body goes cold and still. She can’t do anything more than hold Ward’s gaze as he leans over her.

“She knew I’d need her help,” he says softly as he brushes some of her hair that’s come loose over her shoulder. “But she knew she couldn’t be trusted to keep the mission a secret. So she came up with a plan - a stupid, reckless plan that I did _not_ okay. She let some World War Two era psychopath play with her brain until she forgot. Forgot about HYDRA. Forgot about the mission. Forgot about me.”

He’s breathing so heavily she can feel each swell of his chest. She thinks she might be able to identify that look in his eyes now, but she won’t. She won’t put a name to it because if she does, if she admits he’s looking at her that way, she’ll have to admit he might be telling the truth.

“You’re insane,” she tries to say, but it comes out thin and hoarse. His eyes drop to her mouth. She has to dig her nails into her jeans to stop from leaning towards him.

He straightens. The hand that wasn’t playing in her hair lifts high, revealing a pistol he’s presumably pulled from between the bed and the wall. “Yeah,” he says with a pained smile, “love’ll do that to you.”

He leaves without looking back. The familiar slide of the door is followed by a heavy clang, reminding her she’s a prisoner.

When she’s sure he’s not going to suddenly remember some forgotten weapon, she buries her face in her knees. “He’s lying,” she whispers to the shadows. He’s playing some game with her, trying to put her off balance. This is some play he and Garrett are attempting to run. That’s all.

That has to be all.

 

 

She tries not to think about why, hours later, she wakes to the smell of his sheets and feels like she’s home.

 


End file.
